Paste the navigation code here

Pages

Thursday, June 19, 2014

What Fertilizer to Use on Vegetable Plants in Pots

Plants do best in pots when they are fertilized well...

The first line of defense is to mix in an initial charge of fertilizer in the pot you are going to put your plants in. If it is a large plant like tomatoes and full hand full of organic fertilizer. I use a 8-2-4 organic fertilizer from Sustain. (Don't use a whole handful of synthetic fertilizer or you burn your plants.)

During the growing season you can water with compost tea and every week or so water with a mix of one tablespoon of fish emulsion to one gallon of water. Before the fruit appears you can water the foliage and the plants will love it. When you get close to harvest water the only the soil.

This protocol works for pretty much every type of plant. Lettuce and greens don't need much beyond the original organic fertilizer as they are light feeders.

About 80% of what a plant needs comes from outside the soil. Things like water, carbon dioxide, oxygen, sunlight and in some cases nitrogen fixing bacteria. So many nutrients are independent of your fertilization program.